How to Get Started With Faculty-Led PD

Administrators should always aim to support committed teachers, and one way they can do that is by fostering a faculty-led collaborative culture that enables every educator, regardless of their experience and expertise, to progress toward their professional potential. 

Too often, professional development (PD) means gathering teachers in an auditorium to listen to a onetime presentation while they surreptitiously grade papers. In contrast, ongoing collaborative professional development enables deep, enduring learning for all educators while empowering and honoring the most capable, caring, and committed teachers by providing them with leadership opportunities. 

The two of us have collaborated on such teams for years: as teachers on the same grade-level team, as school leaders spearheading an instructional leadership team, and as the co-founders of cor creative partners, a company supporting professional collaboration. As a result of this work, we know that educators learn best from each other because of their shared experiences and mutual trust.

The first step for fostering a faculty-led collaborative culture is to establish teacher teams that meet regularly with shared purpose. The next step is to empower teachers to lead these teams. We recommend announcing leadership opportunities to everyone and then holding individual conversations to assess interest. This transparency increases the credibility of those ultimately chosen and surfaces each teacher’s ambitions for continued growth.

Next, administrators need to ensure that these leadership roles are actually desirable. One way to do this is by facilitating peer-to-peer support through a faculty leadership group that convenes regularly. Another way to support faculty leaders is by giving them time: releasing them from lunch duty, excusing them from other mandatory PD, or even reducing their teaching schedule.

Equally important is recognition: allocating small stipends for faculty leadership, or purchasing snacks for meetings, or offering continuing education units (CEUs), or having faculty leaders present their collaborative work at conferences or in publications.

Below are three replicable models we’ve used to promote high-quality, faculty-led professional development.

Model 1: Leveraging preexisting formal faculty leadership roles

As secondary school leaders, we leveraged existing teacher leadership structures to support staff-wide growth.

Team composition: Teachers in curriculum coordinator roles

Team goal: To improve literacy outcomes for all students

Support for faculty leaders: We partnered with curriculum coordinators before the year to identify a target literacy skill and plan for staffwide teaching of the skill. We framed the initiative for all faculty to start the year, then met weekly with curriculum coordinators. We created agendas and protocols that these leaders could use with their teams and gathered data based on teacher-created assessments so teams could monitor progress.

Opportunities to lead: Curriculum coordinators led their teams in professional development related to this initiative on five early-release days.

Impact: Increased student outcomes on literacy measures; greater ownership of literacy standards from teachers across content areas

Model 2: Creating formal faculty leadership roles

As consultants working with a pre-K to 8 school without formal instructional leadership structures, we created faculty leader roles to address this gap.

Team composition: One teacher leader per grade band (early childhood, K–2, 3–5, 6–8).

Team goal: Each leader determined their team’s goals. One grade band focused on implementing a new English language arts curriculum, for example, while another prioritized data-driven decision-making.

Support for faculty leaders: Leaders met over four summer days to learn about high-quality professional development, explore the frameworks, and analyze student performance data. For each grade band, we established clear goals and success measures. During the year, we met on five early-release days to adapt model agendas, to practice protocols, and to process problems of practice.

Opportunities to lead: Faculty leaders facilitated their team’s professional development during two-hour sessions on five early-release days.

Impact: All teachers accessed high-quality professional development, renewed engagement from veteran teachers, and improved faculty ratings of school culture.

Model 3: Forming a temporary faculty leadership work group

As consultants working with a middle school, we facilitated an initiative-based faculty work group.

Team composition: One teacher from each grade level (5–8) not already serving in a formal leadership role.

Team goal: To realize the school’s leadership-centered mission by teaching students leadership skills in the academic classroom.

Support for faculty leaders: We created a project road map with key checkpoints, developed data visualizations, and curated tools for work group members to pilot. We framed the work in full-faculty workshops and facilitated four work group meetings each year in which members shared their progress, analyzed student data, made decisions, and established action plans.

Opportunities to lead: The principal intentionally designed the project to gradually transfer leadership from us to the work group members over three years. Work group members piloted pedagogy methods, gathered feedback from students, and utilized grade-level team meetings to provide work group updates and hear feedback. Additionally, they led breakout sessions during full-staff workshops.

Impact: Created a philosophy statement about activating leadership through academic learning and a practical tool kit aligned to the philosophy statement; increased students’ identifying as leaders.

As these examples show, faculty-led collaboration can build buy-in for important initiatives, improve school climate, and spark growth for all educators.